Community Challenge: Should Nintendo move away from hardware?

My simple answer is no. In my eyes, Nintendo is the most recognizable gaming company out there. It was the first system I was exposed to as a child and a company that everyone has had a connection with in the last 2 decades. For people who know English as a second language, Nintendo is the word they associate with gaming. No matter how many times I have told my family about the Playstation 1, 2, or 3, they still called it a Nintendo. I am pretty sure when I get next-gen console in the next couple of months, they will say , "Ohhh you got a new nintendo!". I think it's absolutely adorable and very nostalgic. From what others have experienced with non english speakers, they have encountered the same situation. The few words people recognize when trying to communicate is: McDonalds, Disney, and Nintendo (just to name a few). I feel Nintendo does a great job of exposing you to amazing games, but fail at trying to compete with the on going changing trends. They try to innovate and and get ahead of the curve, and still remain behind. I really hope they figure things out soon, because I was hoping that my future kids share the same experience as I did.

No, I've repeated this numerous times on System Wars and I've written a blog about it, but I'll say it here.

Nintendo abandoning hardware is ASKING for trouble. They'd face even more venomous competition than Sony/MS (Activision, Bethesda, Capcom, Rockstar, Ubisoft, etc). Also add that I just don't think the audiences on either consoles are enough for them (and this comes from someone playing quite a few 360 games from three LEGO games, Batman Arkham Asylum, to Assassin's Creed IV, even count some trips back to Skyrim).

Other things I've noted before is that game quality might be at risk (as seen with SEGA's Sonic the Hedgehog in several noteworthy games like Sonic 06 and the failed GBA port of the Genesis/MegaDrive game) and Nintendo, like the Atari name (which was owned by Infogrames), may just sell-out more and rely on licensed titles (Atari for a time became synonymous with Dragon Ball, which no doubt had some gems, but still a lot of crap).

i hope not...and if they do hopefully they still make games....

theyve given me plenty of joy... they can do what they want now :)

I don't really want to keep buying two consoles just to get multiplats.. I'd be fine with them going third party so long as they were smart about the transition.

It will be foolish for them to abandon the handheld market. As for consoles, they just need a different business plan because their current one isn't working.

no. they just need to be smarter about how they go about making the hardware and how they promote it. they also need to get a lot more focused.
the industry is better when it has something that is different to the competition. thats one of the wiius problems..its not different enough and where it is different its in areas that are not exactly marketable.

they just seem all over the place at the moment.

they want to sell games digitally and have done a good job making digitial versions available in the estore. but then there is no HDD as standard which discourages people from downloading and puts developers off making DLC.

they make a controller with a screen yet they dont seem to have any idea what to do with it (and their developers dont seem to like it).

they stick with an anchient processor unfit for 360 and PS3 ports and yet they wanted to make porting from the 360 and PS3 easy.

they knew the PS4 and X1 were coming and yet have made exactly 0 improvements to make porting from the X1 and PS4 easier....but 3rd party support is a priority for them apparently.

its like nitnendo is 3 companies, there is little communication between the 3 and they have completely different objectives. one wants to chase hardware trends and compete directly against the existing competition, another wants to throw a wrench in the works and another just wants to sell cheap hardware.

they need to have a much clearer idea of what they are about. if they are going to compete with MS and sony directly then everything about them needs to do that. they need the most powerful hardware thats also 3rd party friendly, backed by the most robust online feature set (and they need to loosen the mammy hand for online) and have the best looking and most awesome games with lots of spectacle. they need to back this up with presence at major trade shows like E3 where they can generate twilight princess type hype.

if they want to throw a wrench in the market then they need to do something really different. no one this gen has actually continued with the wiimote/nunchuck setup. its all traditional controller, online everything and features coming out the wazoo. the consoles have become more complicated to use, take longer to get in the game and have a huge focus on getting as much money out of peoples pockets as possible. so a console with the wiimote/nunchuck setup with a focus on local MP and hardware designed to load games as fast as possible on the most responsive OS that is simple to use could be attractive to many.

to third party or not to third party? go after the big publishers like EA and activision or pursue smaller devs with bigger ideas? make a decision either way and shape the platform accordingly.

whatever it is they need to get the whole company behind the idea. at the moment nintendos own developers seem to prefer the wiimote and nunchuck to the gamepad so what chance do they have of developing the killer app? before the wiiu even released nintendo also showed off the new classic controller pro for it which just undermined it further. there is no focus.

on the handheld side they also need to now seriosuly consider whether its time to drop the dual screen idea or not for the 3DSs successor. the 3DS is not going to beat the DS and the dual screen idea is not a system seller or particularly interesting (sadly its never been of great benefit outside of a few games). is it time to nip it in the bud for the next handheld and make something completely new which could make for some interesting gameplay? the other thing they need to tackle is the battle for pocket space. they need to provide a better reason than streetpass to carry around a nintendo handheld. a small, sleeker handheld more akin to the GBA SP may be better placed to get a spot in the pocket.

This is the thread that doesn't end, yes it goes on and on my friend, some people, started commenting not knowing what it was, and they'll continue commenting forever just because (Repeat)

I hope that would never Happen.

If they aren't going to take the industry serious and build a powerful console with a normal controller, they yes they should stop making consoles.

I'm not a fan of companies like Nintendo pushing the boundaries of how we can interact with the video game medium. What's important are hardware developers creating faster, more powerful rendering hardware and adding as many buttons as conventionally possible on a standard controller, all the while having their competitors doing the exact same thing. Nintendo needs to realize gamers wants sex, drugs and uber violence in their games, we need to be cool and not lame playing games with cat suits, chasing bunnies for green stars. I live vicariously through those games and that makes me Mr. Macho. I get all the ladies due to my skills in COD and God of War.

/sarcasm

lol What's scary is that people think like that. Taking COD for example, that game is hated on hard yet everyone still buys it. It comes out for the Wii and people complain. No one will ever be happy.

I just want the old nintendo back :( They need to create an awesome console and stick to it! They've got it with their handhelds.

@osan0: I totally agree. It's like they go with everyone's ides separately and run with it till it works lol The Wii U was not marketed will and most believed it was just a new controller.

No Nintendo means no ideas like StreetPass and Miiverse.

It's a small thing but it's such an integral part of the experience with the 3DS and Wii U. It's little things like that that make me hope Nintendo never stops making hardware.

Not to mention the fact that it is a company that brings a completely different philosophy to the gaming industry. They sure make tons of mistakes, but the fact that they swim against the current has given us numerous gems both in terms of software and hardware.

No, they just need to be smart with their choice of what to implement..things that already known that works should be provided. They can be unique & creative whilst providing what gamers want. Different for the sake of just being different is dumb.

We need 3 competing companies..if 2 well then you just gotta look at Intel & AMD...what's the fastest Intel cpu?...3Ghz+? why are we still stuck on 3Ghz+ cpu?...cause AMD cannot compete.

I hate all this talk lately about Nintendo possibly abandoning consoles. It's not going to happen. The 3DS is thriving, and the Wii U, though struggling a bit, just needs some more killer games and maybe some better marketing and it will be fine.

I like Nintendo. They are special. I am beginning to prefer their consoles again and I would not like having to settle buying their consoles as retro items.

Nooooo. The gaming industry needs Nintendo. Look at kinect, motion plus, ps camera...all because of Nintendo now smart glass vita 2nd screen?? Nintendo... They just mad a bad calculation with the wii u. It should be on par with ps4 x1 not ps3 360 that was a very stupid move but I would like to see the next Nintendo console incorporate the occulus headset vr thing. That would be sexy and a good look for nintendo

I hope not.

No they should not and hopefully will not. Doesnt even matter if the Wii U completely dies and stops being produced (I honestly dont think that will happen), Nintendo always has something else up their sleve. I look forward to the successor of the Wii U. Granted, I'll be waiting atleast another 2 or 3 years before it is even announced officially.

Nintendo needs to stay in the hardware race, but start competing with the other consoles. I feel as though they are always behind the competition i.e. Gamecube did not use DVDs when the new medium was replacing VHS, owning a PS2 allowed for a game system and a DVD player. The Wii was a good idea, but there needs to be an option for a more traditional controller and better specs.

Have not used the gamepad so cannot say I love it, hate it or feel indifferent to it. The issue I saw was that the Wii U was being released before the industry new what the PS4 and Xbone could do, and the Wii U was not a huge hardware upgrade over the 3 and 360. Now Sony and MS have PS+ and XBL, which offers great value over the e-store, and there hardware is better pushing the best 3rd party experience to the other consoles.

Innovation is great and so is competition, but buying a Nintendo to me create there own barrier as hardware is an entrance fee to play maybe 2 Zeldas, a mario or 2 and Smash Bros over the consoles life. Compete on hardware, get the multiplatforms on the system and then it would be console of choice.